#ishango, #ishangobone, #african, #primenumbers, #ishangoprimesieve, #civilizations, #mathematicsinafrica, #africanhistory, #withouthistory, #sankofa, #firstmathematicians, #eratosthenes, #africa

How come nobody has noticed? The markings on the Ishango bone perfectly model a sieve for the prime numbers. It is observed (for n greater than 3) that the middle column M of the bone eliminates from the sequence n = 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10, numbers composed of "copies" of others, leaving behind prime numbers only. See the complete paper: https://osf.io/preprints/africarxiv/6z2yr/
[☆N.B. A "sieve" in mathematics is an algorithm or process for picking out prime numbers from the procession of natural numbers].